What is it that you trust for your standing before God?
"That's obvious" Most of us will shout back. We know the right answer: "My trust is in Jesus."So, let me ask the question again. What is it that you trust for your standing before God? The right answer is not "My trust is in Jesus" but "My trust is in Jesus alone." There is a world of difference between the two. Thomas Chalmers say this:
The foundation of your trust before God, must be either your own righteousness out and out, or the righteousness of Christ out and out. . . If you are to lean upon your own merit, lean upon it wholly — if you are to lean upon Christ, lean upon him wholly. The two will not amalgamate together, and it is the attempt to do so, which keeps many a weary and heavy-laden inquirer at a distance from rest, and at a distance from the truth of the gospel. Maintain a clear and consistent posture. Stand not before God with one foot upon a rock and the other upon a treacherous quicksand…We call upon you not to lean so much as the weight of one grain or scruple of your confidence upon your own doings — to leave this ground entirely, and to come over entirely to the ground of a Redeemer’s blood and a Redeemer’s righteousness.If we lean on anything besides Christ, and Him alone, we are building on quicksand - and we all know what happens when you try to build on quicksand. There is a big difference between saying that we trust in Jesus, and that we trust in Jesus alone. If we are trusting in anything alongside Jesus, we are not trusting in Jesus. Instead we are dishonouring Him by failing to recognise that He alone in the all-sufficient Saviour; that His righteousness alone is the ground of our confidence before God; that His work is a full, complete and finished work.
Therefore, let us be those who are genuinely able to sing:
My hope is built on nothing less,
than Jesus' blood and righteousness.
No merit of my own I claim,
but wholly trust in Jesus' name.
